presentation. i see obviously there are separate and trying to categorize the bigger hotels as opposed to the boutique hotels on the lombard corridor. the marriott hiltons have all the infrastructure to gain the conventions true. is there any consideration for the boutique operators. >> the assessment rate is based on the actual room revenue. so it's not a flat fee. that is the same across the board. so whatever the hotel takes in, that is what they would pay on. so for example,

the first six months it's .5%, but after the first six months the assessment rate goes up to 1.25% of room revenue for zone 1. so they are not going to pay the same as a large hotel would, a small hotel. it's just based on their actual room revenue. but because there is such an increase in their room rates and the demand for their rooms when a convention is in town, that is how they drew the distinction between sort of east of van ness and west of van ness, but the small venues, if they don't have as much revenue they wouldn't pay as much. >> has there been any reach-out to the smaller operators? >> yes, the council are actively doing outreach to all of the hotels. all right. >> commissioner riley? >> hi. thank you for your presentation and after the $500 million

project which would increase the space, how is that compared to san diego and some of our competitors? >> how does that compare to the size of their venues? that is a very good question and i will have to get back to you because i don't have that at the top of my fingers. my understanding is that the conventions that we have been losing to san diego and to other places, you know, have told us why. and these enhancements will address those concerns that we have heard from conventioneers that haven't been able to stay here or want to come here and can't because of the size of our existing facility. it's my understanding due to the load-in and load-out, we can't have two conventions running at the same time. and this would allow us to have up to three conventions at one time, or a larger one and so there wouldn't be as much

downtime in terms, because there would be more space. >> it would be good to know how we compare with our competitors after all of this money, hopefully, we have the upper hand. >> yes. i can get you that information. i just don't have it today. absolutely, it would make us much more competitive. >> thanks. >> commissioner white? >> yes. with the expansion, do we have the capacity as far as hotel and our infrastructure in regards to the guests in town to get around and do all the things that they need to do? >> yes. >> we do? >> yes? >> yes. >> right now we have vacancies in our hotels. so this would address some of that and decrease that. >> commissioner dooley? >> i just kind of wanted to follow-up on what commissioner riley had said.

do we have the research if our competitors are planning to expand during this period where we'll be constructing? >> they are definitely expanding in different cities, yes. so that is a large part of why this is necessary. they have done exhaustive research at the san francisco travels, what is needed? and met with and had many many focus meetings with industry leaders around what is required to support the convention industry. so the design is being very tailored to meet exactly -- they have lots of survey responses as well, as what is required here? we have a lot of seats here. people want to come here. we have one of the highest demand convention centers because they want to be in san francisco. but it's our facility size that is limiting us right now. >> thank you. >> commissioner riley? >> hi.

you mentioned the projected occupancy would be at 87.6% when the expansion was done. so what is the current occupancy? >> i believe it's around 80%. let me see if i can find that for you as well. i don't have all the statistics on the tourism industry. i'm sorry. >> that is all right. thank you. >> i'm more of the finance person on the project, but i could definitely get that information to you. >> commissioner riley we'll follow-up with both of those questions with an email response later this week. >> okay. >> commissioner o'brien? >> thank you for the report. i just wanted to ask about this amendment to allow district term up to 40 years. so i just

wanted to make sure i understand what that means and secondly, what is the situation today? so this is kind of the question, we're amending it so we can create an ordinance that allows us to go into a debt for a longer period of time with bonds than we can do today? in other words, up to 40 years that we can't do to, is that right? >> the state law allows bonds to be levied by assessment districts and said that the districts can be expire before the bonds are repaid, but it doesn't exclusively say you can go out to 30 or 40 years, if needed. so we wanted to explicitly say in our enabling ordinance, if the district levies bond which is allowed under state law, those districts can have a term up to 40 years in order to replay

that financing. so it could be interpreted right now under state law that you could do it, but we wanted to be more explicit and clear, so there won't be any potential challenges in the future. >> so is there something stopping a district from being in existence for 40 years right now? >> again, like i said, the state law is not clear on this and so we deposit want -- didn't want a challenge if we allowed up to 40 years and wanted to amend the local ordinance to allow us to do that. it's allowed, but it's not explicitly clear. >> it's a function of a gray area as opposed to direct effort to prevent local municipalities or districts to put on debt that can go out 40 years? it's not an attempt to stop them from doing that, but just by default of a gray area

that they can't do it? >> i think we're understanding each other, yes. so the state law does allow you to levy bonds? >> up to 40 years? >> it doesn't say up until when. it just says that the district those repay the debt. so it doesn't say how long that should be if the bonds are levied. so we wanted to be clear, our districts can't go beyond 40 years, but they can levy debt. so it's to clarify here in san francisco what works. >> okay. >> because, again, we didn't have the clarity in the state law that we wanted. >> okay. thank you. >> i have one more question. you started some of the renovations already, haven't you? >> the renovations are completed. so that phase of the renovation phase is done. >> okay. >> this is an expansion. so this is separate and above. >> this is hip between part

between the north mall and south mall to open it up? >> yes. >> and the design isn't completed. it's going to go through the whole ceqa and design process, but those general size increases, that is the program we're working with. >> okay. good. >> so they are getting it from expanding within the envelope vertically up-and-down? >> no, they are going to in between the two halls they have a bunch of meeting rooms and they are going to excavate down and connect the two rooms to have one great room, am i correct? >> yes. part of it is the project. >> yes. >> thank you. >> okay do we have any public comment on item no. 5? seeing none, public comment is closed on item 5. public comment on item 6. seeing none, public comment is closed on item no. 6. this is just discussion only. >> yes, due to the schedule,

they needed to move this forward. we went ahead and we did feel it was important for you to have a briefing. >> this was good. thank you very much, lisa. this was very informative. >> thank you very much, commissioners. >> mr. president we're going to call items 9, 10 and 11, would you like to call them together? >> yes please >> and we'll go back to 7 and 8. >> commissioner item 9 is discussion and possible action to make recommendations to the board of supervisors on board of supervisors file no. 121108 transportation code selling or districting from a vehicle restrictions. item 10 discussion and possible action to make recommendations to the board of supervisors on board of supervisors file no. 120193 public works code mobile food truck locations. item 11 discussion and possible action to make recommendations to the board of supervisors on board of supervisors file no. 120125 planning code mobile food facilities at certain

institutions and specified districts. i'm 11 you heard and made approval and it's part of the agenda package to allow you the opportunity to speak to it. item 10 was in a previous form, was approved with recommendation for approval, but substantive changes have taken place and ebb essentially a new ordinance. item 9 is a new ordinance brand new. we're joined by supervisor scott wiener and his legislative aide andres power. >> welcome supervisor. >> thank you. thank you commissioners and i hope you had a great holiday. i was here quite some time ago on a few pieces of this legislative package around food trucks, but i recently introduced an omnibus package.

food trucks are an important aspect of our food scene in san francisco and contribute to diversity and allow those without a brick-and-mortar restaurant and frankly there is a reason why they are frequently lines around so many of these food trucks. they are are in popular demand and expect and want them. more than a year-ago i got involved in this issue because there was an escalating conflict, particularly between food trucks and brick-and-mortar establishments. we saw a few amount of chaos in terms of tons of appeals of dpw

food truck permits to the board of appeals and i got involved to see if we could broker some sort of peace to make sure everyone could go forward and the food scene could continue to thrive in san francisco. i convened a couple different working groups working with business owners, restaurant owners, food truck operators, and then also with san francisco unified school district and school lunch advocates. our goal being to come up with a fair and transparent set of rules for this area. based on more than a year's worth of work i recently introduced this group -- this package of legislation, that i think moves us in the right direction. the legislation has five parts. the first has to do with the distance between food trucks and brick-and-mortar restaurants. there is the very first time to

my knowledge we have ever had a mandatory buffer zone in between food trucks and brick-and-mortar restaurants. there has been discretionary consideration of the number of feet, but never had it mandated. instead it was a discretionary 300' buffer. this legislation will do two things. first it provides a mandatory 50' buffer between a brick-and-mortar restaurant and a food truck. it still keeps the old language about the -- "upon complaints or objection," the mandate is 50', which is about three parking spots. i think that this is a good compromise and the way i know it's a good compromise think

that the food truck thinks it's too restrictive and brick-and-mortar think it's not restrictive enough. so it's a good balance between two very important sources of foodservice in san francisco. another aspect of this legislation addresses the potential overcompensation of food trucks downtown in union square and fisherman's wharf. when we got involved in the process one thing i quickly realized that we have parts of the city that are effectively o limits to food trucks. for example, this piece of legislation was taken up by you and recommended by the commission months ago if a college or hospital campus happens to be in a residentially-zoned area you are not allowed to put a food truck within that campus, even if it's a large campus. it makes no sense whatsoever.

we have legislation that the board of supervisors adopted a number of year end ago putting a large buffer zone around all public middle schools and public high schools. the purpose of that buffer was to protect the school lunch program, so that kids aren't at least easily leaving [kp-eus/] to go to food trucks and also at the time the food trucks were not always necessarily the highest quality and healthfulness of food. there is also an equity concern that kids with more means would be more likely to leave campus. however, 1500' is three city blocks. it's a lot and what it does is that especially in some areas like a lot of commission, it blocks off entire swaths of neighborhoods from having food trucks. so it's a bit of an overbroad approach. so the legislation in addition to allowing food trucks to be on college and hospital campuses even if they happen to be

technically in a residentially-zoned area, will reduce the buffer zone around schools. the buffer zone right -- the original legislation i introduced put a 500' buffer zone around all middle schools and high schools instead of the 1500' buffer zone. through negotiation with the school district and with school lunch advocates we have changed that to 500' for middle schools. middle schools are never open-campuses. there are no open middle school campuses, so there is less of a risk of kids leaving to have lunch at food trucks and 1,000' for high schools with a few exceptions of high schools that are in very, very connected to commercial areas. and for those it would be 750'. so either 750' or 100' for -- 100 0' for high schools.

we have had heard some complaints from this of the big and mortar residents and building owners that they don't always have enough notice about food trucks. the actual establishments never get notice. the owners and managers will get notice and the ground floor tenants will also get notice. the fourth aspect are new restrictions on formula reality food trucks. we have seen the gypping of what beginnings of what could be a trend of formula brick an mortar restaurants starting up food trucks. i believe in addition to being inconsistent with the spirit of what food trucks are in san francisco in terms of an

entrance small business owners, so the legislation will basically say if something qualifies from a bic and mortar perspective as formula retail, than the formula retail controls will apply to the food trucks. otherwise you would have to go to the conditional use process. we're still in dialogue with the planning department about this. this is a very cutting-edge approach. and so we want to make sure we're doing it right and so we continue to work with the planning department to make sure that we have the best approach. and then finally, the legislation amends the transportation code to improve enforcement on food truck permits. right now if there is no permit or violation of permit, the department of public works

does the enforcement. it might take dpw hours to get out there. they don't have enough enforcement staff and the food truck is gone already and if they do catch the violator and issue a notice of violation, those are very challenging to enforce. so what this legislation will do is authorize mta and parking patrol officers on behalf of dpw to issue a citation to a food truck that is violating its permit or has no permit and pos are a little bit more effective than in some other city enforcement functions and quicker in getting out there and enforcing and the ticket can then be enforced through dmv through the vehicle. so it's a much more effective way of enforcing. commissioners this package of legislation resulted from more than a year of work with various stakeholders and

interested parties who were often in conflict. we did our best to navigate a middle path and to take fevering into account and come up with a set of rules that would work for the city. there are new restrictions that did not exist before for food trucks and there are loosening of controls. >> questions, commissioner dooley? >> i wonder why allow any formula retail food trucks the all? >> that is a legitimate question to ask and i think there are two general approaches. one is just to prohibit them. one is to mirror whatever the formula retail controls are for brick-and-mortar. like i said a few minutes ago this is a fairly new and cutting-edge area, because

we're just starting to see formula retail trucks and i'm very interested to know in what the commissioner's feedback and what the planning department thinks and of course what my colleagues think. right now it's drafted as just mirroring the controls, but it's certainly a legitimate topic of conversation to consider to allow them at all. >> thank you. >> any other commissioner comments? well, i want to thank you, supervisor, because i know you have been working with the mobile food truck operators. i know director dick-endrizzi has been involved in those meetings and this is not an easy one, because everybody loves the mobile food trucks and then there are some people who don't. but i think this is a great compromise and i commend you for bringing all parties together. because nobody was doing anything about it and you did and i have to commend you for that. thank you. >> thank you.

>> any other commissioner comments? >> just wondered did we get any communication. there is nobody here presenting, maybe there will be in public comment. did we get comment from the golden gate restaurant association? >> both golden gate restaurant association and boma and were unable to attend. >> myself and my office have been in close contact with boma and ggra and we'll be having a meeting with their members within a couple of weeks. this is scheduled at the land use committee on december 10th. we may continue that into january to make sure that we have every opportunity to meet with them who would like to meet. >> so just based on your own

assessment, having met them, what would you say their feeling on the legislation as proposed? >> i think i don't want to speak for den ken cleveland. i think some people within bom yar would love to see a moratorium on food trucks in the union square/fisherman's wharf area. that has been expressed to me. then we can see if this relieves some of the pressure. i think one of the reasons they have pressure downtown is because there aren't as many schools there. and so you have less of the

issue of the massive buffer zone around schools. so in my view putting a moratorium in place downtown would be going way too far. but we're in very regular communication with boma and ggra. >> director dick-endrizzi? >> yes, just to provide a little information for the public record in terms some of the meetings. when we have the discussions about the criteria of restaurants, so we took a look at how the department of public health issues their licenses to operate as a means of criteria. and there were some discussions around whether we should take a look at whether the restaurant or the food establishment sells liquor, not liquor, that criteria. and so in the meeting, there was lots of discussion around that, and we did come to the

conclusion at the meeting to include the -- we didn't have a liquor/non-liquor sort of means of criteria, so it's very inclusive of large-sized restaurants, full-service restaurants, take-out restaurants, you know take-out food. self-service restaurants. and even fast-food. so the criteria of restaurants is very broad. and while -- golden gate restaurant association needs to speak for itself, but that was one of the things in the meeting that was very important for the golden gate restaurant association in terms of that definition. so that was one of the things that was important in the discussion.

and now as supervisor wiener has said, 50' is somewhat more and somewhat less. >> one other point somewhat related to this that i forget to raise and we have been in conversation with the entertainment commission on this is there are times that you might have a restaurant that is open during the day, but not open at night or not open after 9:00, 10:00 at night, but you have a club or bar that is there and it's very helpful to have your truck out there, first of all it provides a good service for the customers and allows people to eat and dry out a little bit if they have been drinking and does provide a valuable service when there might not be a lot of restaurants open at that time in the area. in the current legislation, a restaurant can waive the 50'. so you could go to a restaurant and say you are not open past 10:00, would it be okay to have a permit for starting at 10:00? we're considering whether to

put an amendment it in to specifically acknowledge night-time uses. so we're currently in conversations, but there is no firm proposal there. but i think we will need to address that. >> great. commissioner dooley? >> i just wanted to see if you could clarify the 50' from a restaurant rule versus the 300' for an appeal? how does that work? why are they different? >> sure. so right now the 300' from a restaurant -- i won't call it a criteria. it's discretionary. if someone objects dpw can consider that. it's a case-by-case kind of thing, where they might say, i'm just again making this up,

that there are already three chinese restaurants around here and we don't think it would be good to put a chinese food truck there. so they can take that into account and require a certain buffer. this would say they can still do that, but regardless, it has to be at least 50'. so the two are not really inconsistent. it would be presumptively 50' at a minimum. but there might be some circumstances or based on the specifics of the area and whatever dpw takes into account; that in terms of making sure there is fair competition. that a higher buffer would be required. >> okay. thank you. >> director dick-endrizzi? >> and i just wanted to also note that dpw